Traffic Analysis Primer
Counters and Trackers
Early in the life of the web counters were fairly popular. A counter is a simple script that records the number of visitors to a site in a text file or database and then displays, either in text of graphically, the count on the website. You may still find them on some amateur pages but for the most part use of them as died out, both because people wanted something more complex, and because they eventually became seen as unprofessional.
Now most professional or commercial sites will use tracking software. Tracking software tells you more than just the number of visitors, but it can break visitors down by date, time, browser, page viewed, referrer, and many other values. Trackers are so named because they can more or less tell you the path a visitor takes through your website. So they do more than just count your traffic, they track it. There are three main types of tracking software for you to choose from.
The Three Flavors of Tracking Software
1. Remote Tracking Services
The easiest to install, and thus the most popular, tracking type is remote tracking services. These are services which house all the traffic reporting and recording scripts on their own servers, which you can log into to check your stats. The recording is accomplished through javascript that is placed on your page(s). Despite their ease of use this type of service is the worst kind you can use for a variety of reasons. The first reason is that it is often inaccurate; because the traffic recording relies connecting to a remote server, a server that is likely bogged down, many of your visitors will not be recorded because the request simply times out. Additionally because they use javascript anyone without that enabled will not be recorded. This is a big issue because search engine spiders do not use javascript and so one of the benefits of analyzing your traffic is nonexistent with these services. Another reason not to use them is that they often require you to place a button or graphic on your site in exchange for the free service. Needless to say this is undesirable to most people. Using one of these services should only be done if you do not have the ability to execute scripts of any kind on your server, or if you lack the expertise to do so.
- http://www.hitbox.com/
- http://www.sitemeter.com/
- http://www.extreme-dm.com/
2. Logging Programs
This is my preferred method of traffic analysis. Logging programs are scripts that you install on your server that then generate both log files (either in flat files or a database) and generate reports for you. The reason I prefer this type of program over a log analysis program (discussed below) is that I feel you have more control with this type of program. Because you control what is logged and what is not, you only track the pages you want to track. The downside to doing this is that you must maintain your log files, and if your site is popular they can grow rather large. On one of my sites which logs over a million impressions a month the log file grows by about 15mb a day so I usually rotate it every 3 days. Now if you use a log analysis program you will still be using large log files, however these are your server's log files and thus they are automatically rotated and maintained for you. An added feature of this type of program is that you can sometimes use them to track links from your site as well, so you know exactly how much traffic you are sending away in a link exchange.
- http://www.xav.com/scripts/axs/ (recommended)
- http://www.ekstreme.com/phplabs/phpcounter.php
3. Log Analysis Programs
These are programs that analyze your server logs and then report your traffic based on them. Some may include advanced filters allowing you to specify what exactly you want reported but most will just report everything in the log files, usually reporting total hits, impressions, and uniques. The quality of the reports generated will depend on what software you actually use. Some log analyzers are free and come preinstalled on many hosting accounts, others can cost a good deal of money.
- http://www.webalizer.com/
- http://www.webtrends.com/
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